#honestly it undermines the narrative

[isan0rt]

Hey crazy thought but maybe Kairi wouldn’t seem like such a ‘wasted character’ if this fandom would quit taking everything of narrative and thematic significance about her and assigning it to Riku constantly all the time.

(The evaluation of the ways in which Kairi and Riku are important and vital foils for each other got kind of long so it’s under a read more; to be clear, I love Riku so much, and it makes me super mad to see his narrative also being undermined by this trend, this is not a hate post.)

Kairi and Riku serve opposing but complementary purposes in the narrative. Kairi represents light, but she also represents the stagnation of the light. Many characters who are associated with just light are also associated with stagnation and a resistance to change. Hoder and Eraqus are particularly extreme examples, but Aqua exemplifies this as well. They want a predictable world where things stay as they ‘should’ be and they are threatened by changes to the status quo. Eraqus in particular refuses to change anything about himself for 60 years, only taking on students at the last minute because he’s running out of time. Kairi, like Eraqus and Hoder and Aqua, stands as the bold, sharp light that casts others into shadow.

However, the other side of “resistance to change” means that Kairi represents restoration. She is able to restore Sora in KH1, pull them home in KH2, and hold Sora back from death itself in KH3, because her power is one of restoration. She holds so tightly to their old way of being that she can stop death itself in the interest of not changing too drastically. But she is unable to move forward on her own, because she fears change too much. She wants to chase after the boys when they keep leaving her behind…but she isn’t able to keep up, because what she actually wants is for them not to run at all. 

She wants to go home, and restore their previous status quo. This desire is consistent in her for the entire series; this is also why she is unable to let go of her childhood crush for Sora, even though he’s obviously not the person she wants him to be anymore. For Sora, Kairi is the rock, she is the home that will always be there, he feels that she is the secure dock he can always return to after the storm. He relies on her not changing, which reinforces her fear of change. Lea is similar, and they can bond in KH3 over both their mutual desires to restore a prior, idealized status quo where their friends were reliably there and not at risk of disappearing on them or running away from them or changing.

Riku on the other hand embodies transformation. He represents change to the status quo, growth and development and a new way to be. Too much change is as much of a problem as too little; Kairi in KH1 sees Riku wants change, and it scares her, and he does in fact go too far. At the same time, she’s the catalyst for Riku’s desire to change their circumstances. Kairi’s arrival at the islands in the meteor shower incites Riku to dream of going to the outside world. This too is a tension that creates an anxiety in Kairi - in a way, she can see herself as to blame for Riku’s desire to change. But Riku was always going to change, because that’s who he is. He is radical change, the change that cuts away restrictive dogma so that the world can advance. Riku drives Sora to also want to grow and change, to excel and challenge himself. Sora wants to be like Riku, whose strength and internal drive he admires.

Ultimately Kairi and Riku are in BALANCE with each other. Ironically, while Kairi is themed as ‘the sea,’ her narrative purpose is to be steady as the earth. Riku’s name is ‘the earth,’ but he is changing and dangerous as the sea. They are one another’s reflections in the narrative. Kairi’s arc is about learning to let go and move forward, even though it scares her. Riku’s entire arc is about finding balance, not throwing away the comfort of the past, that inoculates him from falling too far the way Baldr and Xehanort do. Riku can drive Kairi to join them by giving her a Keyblade too. Kairi can pull Riku back from fleeing from them by seeing him even under Ansem’s face. He is able to be in contrast with Kairi in a healthy way, in a way that honors her fears while also refusing stagnation. They have to work TOGETHER to find Sora, because they are one another’s narrative and thematic opposites. Kairi is too stagnant on her own, and Riku too volatile. Sora is the healthy middle between them, the center-point that can bind the light and the dark TOGETHER for one purpose. 

Kairi is narratively and thematically important to Kingdom Hearts. She represents something, and trying to take the things that reinforce her narrative importance to the story (her representation of the light, her narrative purpose of ‘disruption’ in her arrival via the meteor shower, her position as the one who grounds Sora in opposition to Riku’s position as the one who drives Sora to push himself and achieve more) not only undermines her story, it undermines Riku’s.

#Time to swing the bat at the hornet's nest I guess #God forbid women do anything smh #This thing of writing Kairi off as 'wasted potential' while assigning her importance to Riku is honestly just the same shit as like #the 2002 habit of making her evil in fanfic so she's not a threat with a progressive little hat on it but it's literally just the same shit #Kairi is important to the themes!! She and Riku share an equal and opposite narrative importance!! #It's undermining RIKU ALSO to give Kairi's shit to him!! Riku worked hard on his arc can you fucking let him just be who he is #He doesn't want to be the perfect guy better than everybody else that was the whole point of his story!! #He had to take a level in humility! #PLEASE for the love of god look at a story holistically and not just 'everything here must be about my ship' #Which I also like that ship!! Kairi is too stagnant for Sora #There is already plenty in the narrative for Riku to be a good match for Sora #You don't need to take Kairi's shit too!! Goddamn.

[wen-kexing-apologist]

Last Twilight: Ep 12

The TL;DR of this post is just... Sincerely what the fuck?

I remember posting after Episode 1 that I was keeping a suspicious eye on the mention of the eye donation because while I do think in real life disabled people have the right to manage their disability any way they want to and would support someone's choice to get a cornea transplant, real life is not fiction and fiction is designed to pull messages and themes from. Episode 12 from almost it's first moments completely undermines two and a half month's worth of messaging about learning to accept a new reality. I don't think it is foolish of me to assume based on the set up of the first episode that Last Twilight was supposed to be an exploration of grief as told in conversation and parallel between someone who lost a loved one and someone who lost their vision.

If this story had continued in the way it started out the first half of this show, I honestly think it could have been a 10, those first few episodes I was enjoying so much I was worried it might knock out Moonlight Chicken as my favorite Aof offering. Now I have rated Last Twilight as a 3, I will never suggest it to anyone and I will never rewatch it. Why?

Because from a fictional narrative perspective, having Day gain his vision back at the end undermines the entirety of the show's messaging from the first 11 episodes. Every single lesson, every single message just absolutely obliterated by every moment of Episode 12.

Day getting his vision back right as he and Mhok get back undermines the narrative in the following ways:

Rewarding Day for managing to create a successful and happy life as a blind person (literally like "hey you graduated and ran a bookstore while blind! Congrats you get to be normal again!)

"Rewarding" Mhok by insuring that he never has to do any caregiving for Day going forward so we don't get any navigating or expectation of Mhok and Day being in a longterm inter-abled relationship

We eliminate all chances that the subject of pitying Day re-enters any future fights, meaning there is now zero risk for Day maintaining a relationship with someone he worries might infantilize or pity him

It absolves Night of any remaining guilt he may be carrying from thinking he caused the accident that made Day blind

It absolves Day of any remaining anger at Night thinking he caused the accident that made Day blind

Mhon's ableist fucking ass gets her "normal" son back the way she confided in Mhok she'd hoped for after the first failed cornea transplant

It undermines the theme of the in universe Last Twilight novel and the conversation that Day and Mhok have about Mee being turned in to a statue on the top of the mountain and how that was hopeful because her father had found a sight so beautiful he couldn't think of anywhere else Mee would need to see and instead turns the message essentially in to: "there is hope, you can be cured"

It dismantles their cute couple thing of the one palm distance which also makes the OST that they played all the fucking time completely irrelevant

And most importantly, it undermines all the growth that Day went through while processing his grief and the two, TWO separate occasions where he came to terms with his disability

And that's just the disregard for the narrative messages, giving Day his eyesight back is incredibly ableist in the case of this story because of certain ableist through-lines woven in to the entire show. Namely:

While Day is blind, there is no reciprocity of care. Mhok is always taking care of Day, I cannot think of a single instance where Day really took care of Mhok in a significant way. By focusing so much on Day, and abandoning any strong focus on Mhok's grief over losing his sister, Day is never given an opportunity to be a support system for Mhok. Which is fucking ableist. Disabled people have so many things to offer the world, and while they might have specific support needs that does not mean that they can't offer support in return.

Mhok doesn't introduce Day to his family at their graves until after Day has his vision restored, and it is only then that Mhok says he has someone to take care of him. Able-ist!

Day gets his vision back almost immediately after a conversation with his mother where she says he wants to be normal and the fight he had with Mhok is normal.

Handling the entire story this way, with the break up, and a three year time gap, and then Day having his vision restored literally hours after he and Mhok get back together does not allow for any exploration of Mhok and Day having to figure out the differences between Mhok being his caretaker and Mhok being his partner.

We shunted literally every part of Mhok's backstory completely to the side, which in and of itself is fucking ableist in my opinion because it implies that able bodied people who are caretakers for or who are in a relationship with a disabled person don't have any time for themselves, to deal with their own shit or to have their own needs because they are too busy taking care of a disabled person.

With this being, what, the first main character in a BL with blindness, you want to go for the cure route after acceptance? Like you are rewarding someone for their bravery of handling their disability instead of allowing the disabled person to remain happy and thriving in the life they have built for themselves while they continue to be blind?

I'm not blind, so forgive me if I am overstepping at any point here but in my opinion, if you want a narrative that gives Day back his eyesight, that story that not be written by a sighted person. You need blind writers, people with the lived experience having control over the story so the narrative is better able to navigate the complexity of a decision like that, to reverse a character's blindness. I just think blind people would be able to minimize how much returning someone's eyesight might come off as ableist in a story like this. Additionally going the cure route is not a choice I think anyone should be making with the first BL that focuses this heavily on blindness. This world is so fucking ableist, if you want to make a story with a disabled main character with how slim of pickings there are, it feels much more responsible and subversive to go a disability pride route.

And these are just the issues around disability in this show, I have problems with the classism in this show, I have problems with the absolute ridiculousness of Mhok and Day's breakup and their reunion. MHOK APOLOGIZES, MHOK THANKS DAY FOR BREAKING UP WITH HIM, DAY DOES NOT APOLOGIZE FOR BREAKING UP WITH MHOK OR BLOCKING HIM ON SOCIALS FOR THREE YEARS BECAUSE MHOK PITIED DAY ONE (1) TIME. I get not wanting to be pitied, I get it, but seriously it is so much less compelling to have Day just completely abandon Mhok after all of the positive experiences they've had together because he messed up once rather than reel himself back in and have an adult conversation about what happened and try to get back to a balanced state.

Anyway, fuck this show. I am so disappointed that this is Aof's last directed piece for who knows how long. He could have gone out with a bang after Moonlight Chicken and now I am just fucking thankful I won't have to see anything else from him for awhile.

#last twilight #last twilight the series #let me reiterate that real life is different than fiction #disabled people have all the right in the world to handle their disability and any associated treatments however they want #this is fiction #and fiction reaches a wide audience and therefore has a responsibility in its messaging #last twilight meta #last twilight analysis

[thesunfyre4446]

84 years ago i've promised an alicent and rhaenyra post, and i've finally got around into making it.

so book!rhaenyra and alicent is not that complicated. alicent was fine with rhaenyra when she thought that viserys will name their firstborn son heir, and when that wasn't the case they started beefing & despised each other.

the show's decision of making them former friends is actually a good choice. it adds depth and tragedy into their relationship & makes the entire conflict more personal. instead of the stepmother x stepdaughter dynamic we get 2 childhood friends, destined to become enemies.

young!rhaenyra and alicent arc was actually really good. alicent got married to viserys and tried to mend her relationship with an angry rhaenyra. and just when things were getting better the realization that things can never go back to the way they were & they were destined to become enemies = alicent becoming the green queen & the rivalry truly begins.

and that's where... thing got... messy

because in ep 6 we see alicent and rhaenyra fighting. they seem to hate each other & constantly trying to undermine each other. then we get to ep 7 & driftmark, and we all expected that from that moment on we will get book!alicent and rhaenyra rivalry and hatred. but no? all of the sudden, one dinner and they're friends again?

i'm sorry... what?

and then alicent refuses to hurt rhaenyra and her family, rhaenyra's crying over a piece of paper (i was with daemon going "the fuck is this") rhaenyra shocked over alicent's betrayal & both women do not want to hurt each other.

so, you're telling me that after driftmark - after rhaenyra wanted to have alicent's maimed son tortured & tried to get alicent accused of high treason and after alicent demanded luke's eye these women feel anything but hatred towards each other?

you're telling me that alicent - who has spent the entire show believing that her children's lives will be in danger if rhaenyra became queen suddenly goes "you'll make a good queen" (again, i was with otto giving her the side-eye because GURL) one dinner is apparently all it takes to fix 20 years of rivalry and hatred?

and that's the problem. the show doesn't seem to be able to tell the difference between "friendship" and "relationship". rhaenyra and alicent's relationship can still be the center of the show even if they are enemies. even if they're no longer friends. look at magnificent century, hurrem and mahidevran's rivalry is the center of the show & it's very clear that these two women were forced into becoming enemies and that the real villain is the sultan.

hotd wants to force the "friendship" narrative on the show, but they still have to stick to certain book canon events, so it comes off very forced and unnatural. they're unwilling to let these 2 women become enemies, so they take their agency and give it to otto and daemon. otto and daemon are the ones who want war, rhaenyra and alicent just want to go back into being friends :( look at this page from ep 1 that you've prob forgotten all about!

they literally have to sacrifice their agency. because alicent being the leader of the green council & rhaenyra being the one wanting to go to war against the people who took away the crown she was promised doesn't fit the "friendship" narrative. so let's make alicent unaware of everything & rhaenyra doesn't even want to go to war :( it's all daemon and otto and the eViL mEn. it's honestly such a disservice to their characters. they're stripped of their ambition and agency for the sake of forcing their "friendship".

and the thing that truly made me lose hope is ryan saying that "there's still hope".

my dude.

from the first moment we see the girl. from that first scene where they're sitting under the tree - there was no hope. there was never hope. they're doomed.

#hotd #house of the dragon #alicent hightower #rhaenyra targaryen #anti hotd

[comradekatara]

Im hardly in the atla fandom (rlly you are the only atla blog i follow) but occasionzlly i see a few posts and a lotta the ones concerning aang are so irksome. Posts that have aang showcasin any emotion apart from 'happy go lucky' almost always has the lil quip of 'oh theres the kyoshi coming out in him lol' which really downplays him so much more than ppl already do.

Like he cant even show emotion outside of the expected without it bein attributed to someone else like he's only a conduit for other avatars and not yknow, a character written to have an assortment of emotions

i feel like we (aang lovers aka common sense haters) say this every day, but no one ever actually considers aang’s motivations or interiority because his narrative and aesthetics are not sufficiently compelling to a western audience, especially when contrasted with zuko’s superficial appeal as a “traumatized edgy bad boy.” which is also funny because aang’s trauma honestly eclipses zuko’s, and also aang threw a secret dance party in a cave and helped katara do ecoterrorism and is generally way more cool and badass and tragic and charismatic.

not that it’s a competition. i also love zuko, to be fair. but i do feel like ppl have a tendency to pit them against each other, when in reality the entire point of the whole fucking show is that their bond when they actually collaborate in a friendship of equals forged in empathy and mutual understanding is what allows for balance to be achieved in the world. so pitting them against each other is undermining the show’s entire thesis, but it also perfectly illustrates how ppl will warp these characters to suit a predetermined cliched narrative bc they can’t handle even the barest modicum of complexity or nuance.

they can’t handle aang being flawed or internally complex or messy in any way, despite him literally being the protagonist. it’s how we get the idiot suits over at netflix trying to water down every single character into a single personality trait and no extraneous details or, yknow, flaws. like aang not even running away or wanting to shirk his responsibilities because that would make him to “unlikable” i guess. no one knows what good character writing looks like smh.

also the kyoshi thing was funny maybe like 16 years ago but at this point we literally have two novels full of kyoshi characterization that is good and nuanced. not that you have to read the novels or anything, but like. shouldn’t we know by now that kyoshi is not simply the embodiment of all that is aggressive and violent. and that’s not even how the avatar state works, so. but swagever.

#phoenix-before-the-flame #asks #aang #zuko #aang&zuko #kyoshi #sorry this response is very stream of consciousness and possibly incoherent #im tired….

[abattre]

It's actually so disappointing that Naruto's narrative took the route that it did. Kishimoto created an incredibly interesting world and premise, and ruined it by having everything amount to a shallow message of forgiveness that undermines almost every meaningful element in the story. And it's like,, I want to appreciate the world outside of the plot, but the moral framing of the story makes it virtually impossible because of how disingenuous it is. It completely undermines the audience's understanding of the tragedy and horror of the world so that Naruto becoming Hokage and being the most powerful person in the world by the end doesn't come across as distasteful as it actually is.

Like it's made abundantly clear throughout the story that the village system, and Shinobi society as a whole, is incredibly flawed. Kishimoto goes out of his way to show us that Konoha's council is made up of objectively horrible people. We see first hand how the council's short-sighted ideas of what 'protecting the village' means results in devastating tragedy for people both in Konoha and outside of it. It's clear in how Danzo and the rest of the council act that their atrocious behaviour is them just blatantly abusing their power to maintain their authority. The council has no remorse in anything they do; human experimentation, genocide, slavery, and blatant exploitation is all fair game to them if it preserves their status quo. And instead of maybe, like, addressing Konoha's skewed morality in a sensible way and setting the village up for reform, the narrative just tries forcing the audience to perceive Konoha's genuinely heinous actions as necessities. Which, you know, will work when you're like 8, but once you've grown up and developed some reading comprehension and critical thinking,,, it just feels annoyingly manipulative.

At its core, Naruto is a story that attempts to deconstruct morality. Like this is abundantly clear in how Kishimoto is constantly paralleling the dichotomy of good and evil literally every chance he gets. In the end though, this dichotomy just doesn't work in the context of the Naruto story because the narrative framing of the village being the good guys is just hysterically ridiculous. Konoha is an awful place, that does awful things, and is run by awful people that refuse to change anything because it benefits them for the village to remain awful forever. To anyone with a developed sense of media literacy the village cannot in any way be framed as morally good, so when the story resolves itself with Naruto becoming next in line to govern Konoha under the same unchanging authoritarian regime, with the same council supporting him because of his sheer physical prowess and complete dedication to their twisted ideology,,, it's honestly just an incredibly underwhelming conclusion to a story that made itself out to be more profound than it actually is.

If I had to guess, I imagine Kishimoto just didn't think through how negatively the world he created would reflect on the plot. Ultimately though, you can't write a moral story that's so deeply entrenched in real world social inequity and decide halfway through that because you don't know how to fix these things your story's going to have to be about how they're actually okay to be doing and perpetuating,,, like that is awful and also a terrible lesson to impart on an audience of children. With how serious the issues are in Shinobi society, trying to resolve things with the power of friendship was always going to fall flat. These broad scale injustices can't be brushed aside in that way without undermining their severity and diminishing the understandable impact they had on the characters that experienced such extreme oppression. That's essentially the trap that Naruto's conclusion falls into though, and so the story just ends up feeling incomplete and unfulfilling because none of the issues brought up are actually addressed or discussed with the gravity they deserve.

#i guess kishimoto was hoping the aliens would distract us or something #i love the naruto world but i can't stand the pro-konoha rhetoric like it's just so bad #anti konoha #anti naruto ending #anti shinobi system #pro uchiha #pro sasuke uchiha #pro neji hyuuga

[bonefall]

post/734733274896809984/do-you-ever-worry-your-own-writing-might-come-off that makes sense. i was asking because i'm afraid of accidentally writing misogyny myself and i kind of admire what you do

Hmm... I wish I had better advice to give you on this front, but honestly, the only thing I can tell you is to consider the perspective of your female characters.

Women are people. They have thoughts and feelings of their own, so like... just let them have their own arcs. A lot of the worst misogyny in WC comes from the way that the writers just don't care about their girls (or, in the case of tall shadow, actually get undermined and forced to rewrite entire chapters), so they're not curious about their lives, or WHY they feel the way they do or what they want, or any direction for their character arcs.

Turtle Tail as an example. She'll often just end up feeling whatever Gray Wing's plot demands. She's gotta leave when Storm dumps him to make him feel lonely. She shows up again to love him in the next book. Lets her best friend Bumble get dragged back to Tom the Wifebeater, but is sad enough about her death to be "unreasonably angry" with Clear Sky, and then calms down and accept Gray Wing is right all along.

And then she dies, so he can have his very own fridge wife.

In this way, Turtle Tail's just being used to tell Gray Wing's story. They're not interested in why she would turn on Bumble, or god forbid any lingering negative feelings for how she didn't help her, or even resentment towards Clear Sky for killing her or Gray Wing for jumping to his defense. She isn't really going through her own character arc.

She does have personality traits of her own, don't misunderstand my criticism, but as a character she revolves around Gray Wing.

So, zoom out every now and then, and just ask yourself; "Whose story is being told by what I wrote? Do my female characters have goals, wants, and agency, or are they just supporting men? How do their choices impact the narrative?"

But that's already kinda assuming that you already have characters like Turtle Tail who DO have personalities and potential of their own. Here's some super simple and practical advice that helped me;

Tally the genders in your cast. How many are boys, how many are girls, how many are others?

And take stock of how many of those characters are just in the supporting cast, and compare that to the amount you have in the main cast.

If you have a significant imbalance, ESPECIALLY in the main cast, fire the Woman Beam.

It's a really simple trick to just write a male character, and then change its gender while keeping it the same. I promise women are really not fundamentally different from men lmao. You can consider how your in-universe gender roles affect them later, if you'd like, but when you're just starting to wean yourself off a "boy bias" this trick works like a charm.

Also you're not allowed to change the body type of any girl you Woman Beam because I said so. PLEASE allow your girls to have muscles, or be fat, or be old, or have lots of scars. Do NOT do what a cowardly Triple A studio does, where the women all have the same cute or sexy face and curvy body while they're standing next to dwarves, robots, and a gorilla.

Or this shit,

If you do this I will GET you. If you're ever possessed by the dark urge, you will see my face appear in the clouds like Mufasa himself to guide you away from the path of evil.

Anyway, you get better at just making characters girls to begin with as time goes on and you practice it. It's really not as big of a deal as your brain might think it is.

Take a legitimate interest in female characters and try not to disproportionately hit them with parental/romance plots as opposed to the male cast, and you'll be fine. Don't think of them as "SPECIAL WOMEN CHARACTERS" just make a character and then let her be a girl, occasionally checking your tally and doing some critical thinking about their use in the story.

(Also remember I'm not a professional or anything, I'm just trying to give advice)

#I wish I had more succinct and practical advice to give you besides the woman beam trick #Honestly I just kinda feel it out because I like telling stories about girls #I made it fun for myself by clapping and cheering and whooping and hollering whenever a girl does something #because it's not fun to write like a monk in a monastery #With the spectre of Brother Smockbimble looming over your shoulder telling you to Write Perfectly Every Time #Characters aren't real people. You can just fix it if you happen to fuck up or do better next time with what you learned. #Making mistakes is just part of acquiring skill #and writing is an art just like painting or drawing. #So don't make a fun OC project into homework! You should be enjoying making your own art! Express yourself! #Please understand that when I'm ripping into the series I'm being so harsh because it's bestselling corporate media #Read by HUNDREDS of thousands of kids worldwide #Raking in millions of dollars a year. Written by a TEAM of professionals. #So I have higher expectations of it than of a fandom rando on the internet. Or even a self-published author who's just One Guy. #Hence why I'm infinitely more charitable to Ratha than I am to Battle Cats #bones gives advice

[rottmnt-residuum]

In an ask you said that there won't be anything more severe than a lobotomy, but that doesn't mean there won't be anything worse, depending on what we consider worse I guess. But I'm still stuck at the lobotomy part and the effects of that. More like the emotional and mental part, since if I'm not mistaken it wasn't rare for patients to kinda lose... their empathy, or like feelings that they had for loved ones. I could be wrong but this thought just keeps bugging me.

Also will you explore the aftermath and healing part after their well, suffering ends? All the effects of what they've been through?

And... what do you exactly consider worse than a lobotomy? Like what type of thing could be worse in your opinion?

^^^ tags from a different ask.

While a decrease in empathy can happen- it's just one of the many symptoms of brain damage in general. Because what happens to Donnie, while technically a lobotomy, is basically just very deliberate brain damage. More in line with past lobotomies than current ones. It's very much not a targeted thing and more a, 'let's cause havoc til whatever we don't want to happen doesn't happen anymore!'

In Donnie's case, the area that is the most effected is the region of the brain responsible for speech and language. Of course the brain isn't really separated into sections that aggressively, so some other things will be effected, but that will be the most obvious difference. In fact, it's something you can already see happening if you paid attention in the ninpo space.

However, there are other things going on with Donnie, so be careful with what you identify as a symptom of brain damage.

Loss of empathy was never something we were going to go for, as it's very much... not something we enjoy? As well as something we see as very undermining of his established character. We don't really like the fandom interpretation of a low empathy Donnie, either. We see Donnie as very empathic, he just doesn't show it in a way that a lot of people would recognize. He's very much a fixer.

And while losing empathy could be interesting to explore, it very much conflicts with the themes of Residuum as a whole. So, not something y'all have to worry about ahaha

Aftermath wise... well, that's pretty far off. So my feelings might change, but I've never enjoyed healing narratives. Granted, it's just how other people handle them that I don't enjoy. So, I suppose yes, we would be exploring the consequences, but much of that is already planned in Residuum. Though, not really with a... comfort aspect. Anyway. If a healing arc does happen, it will either be an epilogue, its own comic, or something that co-author would do.

Also, can you really look at what I've done so far and honestly say that I'd be able to write comfort/fluff?

...Though, if y'all really wanted it, I guess I could try skskskskks

As for what I find worse than a lobotomy... In Residuum, the worst possible thing that could happen to someone, in my opinion, is demutation.

#residual asks #rottmnt #tw lobotomy mention #tw discussion of lobotomy #a trope you will not see in residuum is loss of identity #that trope does not mesh well with my brain #mistaken identity though... #:) #residuum wb

[litnerdwrites]

It's interesting how Nesta had to apologise for something she wasn't even in the wrong of doing while Rhys, who overreacted by threatening to kill her (for a mistake he made) and chasing her out of the city, did not have to. Especially, after it was canonically established by Feyre herself that he did not have the right to do that..

And for someone who claims to write about badass female mcs who crush patriarchy and choose the course of their own lives, shouldn't an apology scene for something in which a female's right to information on her own body was undermined be a fundamental part of the book?

I mean, she could add a bonus chapter about the characters in question fucking to make babies but had to keep the apology off-page? Weird.

The only somewhat sufferable part of the book was the scenes with the Valkyries and the smut (if you ignore the poor timing).

I don't know if it's my eldest daughter syndrome acting up but I feel strongly about this.

I agree completely. I won't deny that Nesta has some things to apologies for, but so does Rhysand, and Feyre and Mor. I'd even argue that the things the IC put her through negate the need for her to apologies, or at least makes it a little less urgent/important than the apologies she's owed. This is mostly due to the fact that Nesta's so-called crimes amount to a bad attitude (most on page examples of which are pretty understandable to me), and issues she had with Feyre in childhood. Meanwhile, the IC's actions are immature and ignorant at best, and extremely abusive at worst.

Honestly, I don't think any of them, much less Rhysand, see what they did as a mistake. If any of them did, they wouldn't have made her walk through those woods. Feyre would've demanded Nesta be brought back otherwise, but she didn't.

As for Rhysand, honestly the part where he hugged Nesta gave me ick. Especially when Nesta said he'd been acting like a brother the whole time because he hadn't. He abused her. He broke her down. He only showed any semblance of decency (even then it wasn't much) when she did something to benefit him.

Offering pity jobs for somebody else's sake without taking into account Nesta's strengths or passions into account isn't what a brother, or anybody who cares for her, would do. Staring at her like a circus attraction when she enters the room isn't something a brother would do. Forcing her to social events just to ignore her isn't something a brother would do. Financially abusing her, refusing to give her a salary for her work during the war, along with her inheritance, is not something a brother would do. Not caring for her wellbeing beyond how her sister feel's is not something a brother could do. I could go on.

I think, at the end of the day, this amounts to a simple fact. SJM clearly doesn't see anything wrong with the things she writes and narrative she creates. No matter how you argue that ACOSF is a healing story, not a redemption story, it doesn't matter. Through analysing the sext, the author clearly shows how she feels about Nesta. Looking at what she says about the book, the author clearly has little understanding of mental health, and hasn't done enough research on it to be able to write a healing arc that isn't straight up abuse/torture (seriously, the bar is in the crust of the earth).

ACOSF could've been the best book in the series. All of the material, the concepts, the potential was there. Nesta's story was set up in ACOFS, and perhaps I wouldn't have minded the actions of the IC as much (from a literary perspective anyway) if they had been acknowledged as wrong and the IC apologised. I don't think anyone would've minded the locked in the HOW plot either, if, at some point, the characters acknowledge how abusive it was. If the narrative itself acknowledged how messed up it was, and did something about it.

If Cassian apologised for abandoning her after the war, Cassian especially. If Feyre apologised for not trying to reach out in a way that Nesta was comfortable with. If Elain apologised for not being there for Nesta the way Nesta was for her. If Mor apologised for, intentionally or not, isolating Nesta from the rest of the court. If Amren apologised for her comments. If Rhys apologised for sticking his nose where it didn't belong.

Rhys apologising for the hike, or threatening to kill her would mean nothing because both he and the narrative don't see anything wrong with his treatment of her. If he did, then the forced training/library/stuck in the how part would've ended half way through the book.

The part that infuriates me the most, however, is that they don't see their wrong doings at all. They still think they're doing the right thing and that they know everything. It's messed up.

#anti acosf #anti ic #anti inner circle #nesta deserves better #anti amren #anti mor #anti rhysand #pro nesta archeron #pro nesta

[oliveroctavius]

Honestly, the more I think about it, the more I'm bummed out that the really interesting meta commentary in ATSV on comics lore, what makes Spider-Man a Spider-Man on a meta creation level, etc. had to revolve around the Death of Captain Stacy as THE canon event bc it really ramped up the copaganda to a level where it's intrinsic to the narrative, and for what? Off the top of my head, 'death of a police captain close to Spider-Man who dies heroically saving a child' isn't that common across spider characters or even Peter specifically (it doesn't even really fit TASM), and I know the narrative in BTSV is going to prove that Miguel is wrong that it must happen bc it's obviously not a really a necessary event even if you look beyond Miles, but as it is, it's treated as fact bc not a single character beyond Miles questions it even though most of the spiders wouldn't have that event in their narratives.

I suspect they chose it partly bc the Death of Gwen Stacy would be the expected canon event and they absolutely played with audience expectations there leading up to it, and I get not going with it bc it's tired, misogynistic, and traps Gwen in a 'But is she going to die?' role yet again, but the copaganda is really dragging it down the more I think about it, especially if you, say, project where Hobie's actions are headed if he's going to help Miles save his cop dad, which undermines all the earlier anti-authority stuff against Miguel, etc.

I get why it's specifically useful to raise the stakes for Gwen and Miles, I guess... very well-known cop dads in the comics, so it locks in well with the family/mentor conflicts. It's like, Miguel's position is such an obvious strawman that no matter which plot beat you pick, it will be stupid from a dozen spiderpeople's perspectives. And yet people actually talk like that on twitter all the time.

MY pitch for an alternate canon event would have been—wait no don't look at my icon that will give it away—"your best friend becomes jealous and in trying to become a supervillain meets a horrible end". That covers not just the comics but Raimi, TASM2, AND Gwen's backstory and would be the perfect excuse to expand on Ganke's relationship with Miles. Like obviously Miguel is wrong and Ganke doesn't fill that story role. But might he? What if Ganke had an internship at Alchemax? What if the Spot saw Spider-Man save Ganke and decided he was going to origin story the hell out of this kid that his arch-nemesis obviously cared about? Was becoming Ganke's friend and telling him his secret identity a mistake, vindicating Gwen's closed-off worldview? Huh??? What then???

#MCU (dys)synergy look what you've taken from meee #ganke lee #ATSV spoilers #spiderverse #ganke

[runninguplenorahills]

!!Rant incoming!! Because I truly think I’ve never seen something quite like this thing some people in the tag have with Mike Wheeler!

Mike expresses his insecurities about being worthless and not good at anything and Will builds him back up by telling him that he’s an inspiration to the party, that he’s their leader and therefore essential and important to every mission, that he’s the heart that holds the whole team together. Which is all true! Mike has an extremely distorted perception of himself and Will helps him too see who he actually is!

And what do the people in the fandom do? Make posts left and right about how “Omg Mike is only the heart for Will but Will is actually the heart of the party”, “Will sees Mike as a knight in shining armor while Mike actually holds a candle stick”, “Mike is not a knight, he’s the damsel in distress”, “Mike can’t fight for himself but that’s okay because Will is gonna save him”, “Mike needs to use his brain for once”, “Mike is incompetent”, “Mike wouldn’t be able to use a sword” “Mike wouldn’t be able to use a gun” “Mike can’t win a fight” etc. totally flipping it all around and creating this false narrative were Will is the one with the distorted perception of who Mike actually is!! YOU COMPLETELY MISSED THE POINT!!

In all of those polls that get created Mike always ends up being the butt of the joke because “Mike isn’t as muscular as Will so of course Will is better than him at absolutely everything”, “Mike is too dumb to be good at that”, “Mike is super clumsy so he can’t do that”. Or fanfictions where “Mike doesn’t know his way around Hawkins”, “Mike has no common knowledge”, “Will has to do everything for Mike because he can’t do anything on his own”. Which of course goes hand in hand with depicting Will as perfect as well as assigning all the “positive” attributes to Will while assigning the “negative” ones to Mike. And back to the polls, literally the only polls in which Mike wins are the ones where the question is who of the party members is most likely to be, like or do something and it’s either related to falling down or it’s a gay stereotype!! [which is a whole other problem!]

This general perception of the characters that has somehow formed, in which Mike is this total “cringe fail loser” who’s clumsy and stupid and needs everything to be told, who can’t do anything right and gets villainized for his oh so many mistakes, while Will is super over confident and cool, above average at every single thing he does and is always chill and doesn’t do anything wrong, is incredibly bizarre to me. THIS IS NOT AT ALL WHO THESE TWO ARE!!!! And the thing is, one of the many great things about byler is that Mike and Will are equals and treat each other as such!! Turning around and making Will stand above Mike totally ruins a big part of what makes this ship so good!!

And it’s just especially frustrating with Mike, not only because people totally undermine who he is and what he’s capable of, but also because we have this scene of him opening up about feeling useless, worthless and overall like he can’t do anything right! We have this in the show!!! And Will gives him a truly wonderful, emotional, heartbreaking love confession in response to build him back up! The point Will made is: “This is who you are, Mike, and that’s why I love you so much!”, and not: “I love you so much and that’s why I see you this way”!!!! As I said, if you honestly believe that Will is the one with a distorted perception of Mike, and not Mike, then you completely missed the point! And quite literally, you too have a distorted perception of Mike Wheeler as a character!

Again, I’ve truly never seen something quite like this!! Mike expressing that he feels like he’s worthless, Will proving to him that he’s not, and the fandom turning around and going: “Well actually, Mike is worthless and everything Will said about him is only how he sees him.”

And all this while Mike Wheeler is canonically super intelligent and capable, solving problems left and right, coming up with the best plans every season and always ready to fight!!! Everything Will said about Mike is objectively true! He is a an exceptional leader! He is inspiring to everyone in the party! He is getting and holding the whole team together! This is all canon!!!

But I guess some of y’all are watching a different show….

Of course I’m well aware of the fact that everyone interprets and sees characters differently and has their own headcanons. But in this case people are completely disregarding what is explicitly and obviously shown about the character in canon to push a worse fanon version!! People are making the most bizarre and out of character statements about Mike Wheeler and the whole tag will applause them that the takes are so in character, even though they’re clearly not! They quite literally mostly directly contradict with what we know about the character in canon!! And somehow there are still people who think the show is gonna pick up on the made up version!! This widely accepted misinterpretation of Mike’s character is insane to me because people actually think that it’s canon even though it pretty obviously is not! It’s incredibly bizarre, especially because the fanon version is clearly so so so much worse than the real, canon Mike Wheeler!!

And it’s so ironic seeing this happen so much in the byler tag specifically because we are supposed to be the ones on Mike’s team! We’re the ones criticizing melvins and the ga for undermining Mike’s character, all while there are some of you who do the exact same thing.

#i know some of y’all are joking when saying stuff like that #but it’s just not actually funny #it’s more frustrating than anything #byler #lenora rants #mike wheeler lover protecter and defender first. human second #mike wheeler protection squad #mike wheeler

[isan0rt]

You know, when you consider Azure Moon as a self-contained narrative, the use of ‘unanswered questions’ and ambiguity as a reinforcement of the themes of the route are really effective. I honestly think having the route not address the Slithers was the best narrative choice IntSys could possibly have made given the themes of Azure Moon.

Like. The developers didn’t really expect people to actually play all the routes; they designed the game so ‘everyone would have a different experience.’ As a result, all the routes have very different themes and scopes. Azure Moon is the tightest, most character-driven narrative despite not being the shortest route.

And Azure Moon is about grief.

Grief hangs over the entire route; except for Mercedes, every single one of the Blue Lions is haunted by the Tragedy of Duscur and the unanswered questions surrounding it. Felix loses his brother directly, and his worldview and best friend to the aftermath. Ingrid loses her fiance, but also her sense of security; without Glenn, her people may starve, and her personal future is now uncertain. Sylvain and Glenn were the same age, so we can assume they were friends, though his loss is less direct; Sylvain is surrounded by people broken by loss, including his own father. Annette’s father leaves her family in disgrace over being unable to stop the tragedy. Ashe loses his foster brother to the aftermath; and later his foster father as well. 

Dimitri and Dedue lose everything.

All of them spend the whole route wanting to find answers and some kind of closure for this event. It drives the entire narrative for all of the Lions actually from Faerghus. Mercedes, meanwhile, stands as an outside observer to that tragedy - but she is also dealing with her own personal tragedy and unanswered questions about her brother, and that drives her during Azure Moon.

And the thing about grief is that sometimes you never get closure. But you still have to move on, anyway.

That’s the whole point of Azure Moon. Dimitri has to move on. All the Lions have to move on. 

Mercedes cannot regain her brother, whether you find out his identity or not in the route. She has to move on anyway. Dimitri cannot reconcile with his family, not with Rufus (Did Dimitri kill him? We the viewer can never really know for sure) and not with Edelgard. He never finds out whether Patricia wanted to kill his father, or whether she loved Dimitri at all (and we the viewer don’t, either). He has to move on anyway. The Lions never find out the cause of the tragedy.

They have to move on anyway.

Involving the Slithers at that point would not only add a bunch of last-minute narrative complications that aren’t necessary in Azure Moon, it would undermine the emotional impact of the route (in much the same way the last map of Verdant Wind does, honestly). The themes of Azure Moon not only don’t need to answer the question of the Slithers; not answering that question is the point. Bringing up the Slithers at that point would take all the air out of the personal drama the route takes its entire runtime addressing.

Dimitri hesitates at the end. He stops, and tries to look back, and Byleth stops him. He has to move on. He can’t keep looking back at Duscur. He’s got to walk forward. 

And that means leaving his questions unanswered. 

#Fire Emblem Three Houses #FE3H #Blue Lions #Like honestly if you look at the route as the ONLY route you play #The story is incredibly well self-contained #In a way that also makes you want to play other routes! #Azure Moon IMO is really effective from an emotional impact perspective #Like. assuming you like deconstructions of Hamlet because that's what Azure Moon is lbr #Incidentally I personally don't think Dimitri actually killed Rufus....but I don't know!! He could have!! I will never know for sure. #That's the point.

[halcarols]

re: space cops. honestly the claim that green lanterns “aren’t really cops” is the one (1) take i will never get behind because it inherently undermines all possible ideological interactions with the narrative,, like at this point it’s willful ignorance to dismiss how the green lantern corps (as in military corps!!) have been portrayed as a paramilitary police force and used as propaganda. discomfort may be the knee-jerk reaction, but questioning your discomfort is THE most compelling aspect of the experience!!!! why make the story more boring for yourself

#can’t even blame geoff for this one because his vision for gl was explicitly TEXTUALLY pro-military #sorry for spacecopposting again i’ll get better soon 🫶🏼 (← lying) #🌃.txt

[theflyindutchwoman]

Jumping on your previous ask... In the hospital Ashley said to Tim "I still love you. I'll probably be in love with you for longer than I'd like."

That too was too casual to be the first time she said ily to Tim. Do you see him saying it back to Ashley?

Oh that's interesting because I actually always interpreted it as the first time Ashley said ILY. It was casual, that's true… But, I don't know, I guess it just came out of nowhere for me? Unlike with Chris. Regardless of how I feel about him (and how reluctant Lucy was for all these steps), the narrative made it clear that he was serious : calling Lucy his girlfriend after a couple of dates, wanting her to meet his mom (on Mother's Day of all days), pushing her to go to UC school because he knew that's what she wanted amd calling Tim, wanting to move in with her… That's something that spanned several episodes.

We didn't really get any of that with Ashley. And to be clear, I don't begrudge her at all for not wanting to get married or to have children. That's not what my hesitation is about. It's the fact that Tim didn't even know any of this until Lucy basically pushed him to have this conversation with his girlfriend. And even then, it stayed on a surface level. Tim didn't really talk about what he wanted. It was more about making sure that Ash knew he didn't intend to propose. And how she wasn't even expecting this to begin with. Which completely undermined any sentiment that they were heading that way. So by the time we got to that hospital scene where she breaks up with him, it felt too little, too late. It felt more like a last ditch effort to have him retire than genuine. If she had said those words before surgery, I may have had a different read on this… But as it is, it didn't help at all. I have no doubt that they were somewhat serious (she had Genny's contact info for instance and jumped at the opportunity to plan his retirement). I'm just not sure they had said ILY yet. And truthfully, I have a hard time picturing Tim saying it after Vegas. It would have been too disingenuous. That and he honestly gave me the vibes that he was only going with the flow after that double date. So while I don't completely rule out that possibility, I don't think he ever said ILY to Ashley.

I'm curious as to what you guys think though :)

#ask & ye shall receive #the rookie #chenford #tim bradford #lucy chen

[distort-opia]

Do you think giving rise to the Joker would ruin his character?Honestly, in my opinion, it would completely ruin his character. I think the Joker not having a definitive origin is what makes me love the villain. The aspect of him being mysterious, and an unstoppable chaos is absolutely amazing. I honestly lose all desire to read any Joker comics when they create a definitive origin for him. And honestly, I hated that the three jokers were canon.

Myeah, I feel you. There's a reason I haven't kept up with comics recently (besides real life sucking out my soul with the amount of work I have to do). I just don't like what they're doing with Joker, ever since the idea of multiple Jokers resurfaced. Zdarsky and Rosenberg are good writers, but not even them could overcome my utter dislike at the idea of multiple canonical Jokers... I mean it's not their fault, it's fucking Geoff Johns' fault, but still.

I do agree that delving into Joker's backstory so much takes away from his character, although I can't say I am entirely opposed to stories hinting at it or exploring it. It's such an interesting aspect of him, the way he rebuilds himself and his past and his whole personality-- so I don't think this should be left untouched. It should just be done well. The thing about Joker is that he's Batman's narrative foil and parallel; if Batman is human, Joker is human. They both want to be more than that, but at the end of the day they're two human beings, and that's the appeal. If Joker is honestly depicted as an almost supernaturally evil monster whom Bruce cannot defeat... it completely undermines the dynamic. What's interesting is to have Bruce believe these things, and even Joker himself desperately try to leave humanity behind, but then have the story point out that it's just not possible (like Snyder did, God bless). That Joker is still a person, who despite the mystery and the subterfuge, does have a past. But turning that past into a certainty traps the character into a box, when versatility is one of his core traits. Not to mention how badly it fucks him up to imply he never had agency in his becoming as Joker (like in the Multiverse arc with Darwin Halliday).

To sum up, I don't think stories touching on Joker's past entirely ruin him as a villain. I think it very much depends on the capacity of the writer, to handle a character of Joker's complexity.

#no idea what's going on in Joker: Year One. I only saw the Batjokes crumbs but #I just don't feel any draw to reading. I'll probably wait until this whole thing is done and we get a definitive answer #on the multiple Jokers thing. so I can START PRETENDING IT DOESN'T EXIST #asks #joker

[red-elric]

theyre foils theyre foils theyre playing the same type of role theyre holding similar positions among their friends and the narrative their backgrounds and outlooks have fundamental parallels but their dispositions are fully antithetical to one another. this is about vriska and karkat btw.

its about doing their best to play a role in alternian society. its vriska desperately looking up to and imitating mindfang and killing other kids to avoid being eaten by her own lusus, its karkat training to become a threshecutioner and glueing his lips to )(IC's boots despite knowing he'll be killed without a thought when his mutation is discovered. its how both of them felt that pressure to kill and grandstand and become a LEADER but while vriska had the strength to actually follow through with it karkat had the strength to choose not to. its how if either one of them hadnt been there no one on their team would have made it through sgrub. its how every single person hurt by vriska turns to karkat instead afterwards (karkat telling aradiabot hed dedicate a whole team to bringing her back to life if he could in openbound. tavros texting karkat for help when he was paralyzed. sollux being one of karkats best friends at the beginning of hivebent, and seeming to have cut a lot of ties with the rest of the flarp crew. kanaya putting her energy into taking care of karkat after vriska broke her heart. terezi falling into some sort of romance with karkat after cutting ties with vriska. eridan asking karkat for advice over and over again after being dumped by vriska, and actually getting it too.)

its the way they so badly want to BE each other. karkat wants to be feared and respected, vriska wants to be loved unconditionally. vriska, who can see everyone shes ever cared about giving up on her and gravitating towards karkat, but still treats him with as much respect (or more!) as anyone else. she never tries to kill him, she never truly undermines his position among the team, she just faces him head on and treats him like an actual person, even when she takes over leadership post retcon. karkat, who has heard time and time again how much vriska sucks, who fully understands how much she has hurt so many of his friends, who isnt afraid to say to her face his opinion of her, but still gives her the benefit of the doubt to anyone asking. when she's kicked off the blue team and asks him if she can join the red team, he still lets her, and he's always willing to give her a second chance, especially if terezi's backing that choice. its how they want to be seen the way the other is seen, and they offer that respect/clemency to the other, and neither of them really knows how to hold it

its about terezi. isnt everything? its about loving her to the point of obsession, and how terezi feels like she has to choose between them, she cant or wont choose them both. its the flip of a coin, vriska, then karkat, then vriska again, and theyre the same coin really but they cant both be face up at the same time. its about how they both desperately need her attention, her salvation, her protection, her judgement, and they cant both get it, and they know it. its a little about john, too, about being his two guides through sburb, and honestly about how they both had a crush on him.

its about how when vriska died the team fell apart, crushed by inaction. its about how when karkat started to feel irrelevant (because he lost that moment of soothing gamzee and ending the cycle of violence on the meteor. vriska neutralized him instead, and karkat lost his importance) the team stopped feeling like a collection of real people, with strong connections to one another. its the delicate balance between the thief of light, the one who takes all of the narrative relevance she can get and will tear everything apart to make sure its all about her; and the knight of blood, the one who unites the shared feelings and connections of everyone together and heals and protects what has been hurt by her. they complement each other, and they need to stay balanced so that she doesnt burn out too quickly and leave him with nothing to protect, so that he isnt overwhelmed by her light leaving her unfettered.

#it me #homestuck #vriska serket #karkat vantas #meta #idk theyre making me crazy!!!!!

[decepti-thots]

Really enjoy your post about Optimus holding onto skewed views of his relationships. I think a lot about how soon he started calling Megatron a friend when they interacted maybe twice and said interactions weren't exactly pleasant. How he undermined Bee and treated him as just another politician while calling him friend. How we don't really see him have much of a personal or pleasant relationship with Prowl and he calls him friend. There's so much distance between Optimus and the people important to him, and we know he knows that, but he doesn't talk as if that distance is there most of the time. By the end of IDW1 it really felt like he didn't have any friends at all even though a lot of characters would probably say otherwise. The character we see have the most significant legitimate friendship with Optimus (in my opinion) is Senator Shockwave. And even he had ulterior motives.

This is EXCELLENT anon, exactly right IMO. A lot of the Megatron-Optimus stuff in particular I think is a peculiar byproduct of phase two writers (lbr, mostly Roberts) attempting to make IDW Megatron-Optimus into something that more strongly resembles the kind of dramatic narrative that exists in other continuities but realistically just does not make sense in IDW at that point; obviously the easy one to point at is TFP, but actually this also is a situation where Marvel G1 and G1 generally actually does also have that vibe, if you take into consideration the lesser-known prose stories for Marvel especially. And it has this fascinating knock-on effect in IDW of creating the dynamic you're highlighting here, which honestly is much more interesting than if Optimus had had those genuinely close relationships, and which I think Barber is able to kind of work with more deliberately in his later work in the comics. He's constantly trying to create these connections retroactively, to fill a gap because the gap exists in the first place. Hell, at one point in the exRiD/OP stuff he calls Soundwave 'old friend', and like. They are not old friends. But Optimus certainly would have known of Soundwave, and you can see how the narrative would get constructed, out of the need to have some kind of interpersonal continuity he would otherwise totally lack. It's like he so lacks strong interpersonal relationships he substitutes symbolic ones by way of the war, almost. It's all he has after a certain point! Those ideological touchstones, in place of actual connections, some of it self imposed, some of it externally forced on him.

A lot of the real tail-end stuff with Optimus in IDW is about constructed narratives and their power and how they can constrict the people trying to live within them, and I think it fits perfectly with this, honestly. IDW Megatron and Optimus weren't ever actually friends, but they both understand how they could have been, and in their own way they both try and create narratives in their post-war lives that allow them to explore that now they've made themselves into people who cannot properly connect to anyone around them. (I really dislike the LL 'Megatron goes off to the functionist universe' stuff for various reasons, but one thing I actually do think is potentially fascinating is the way it allows him to live out a fantasy of actually knowing Orion, just because it highlights how he never did in the way the audience might assume by default.) And even pre-war, the way Orion lived his life- essentially as someone who did not understand his own complicity in the downfall of things and the structures of corrupt power until it was too late- did not create any long-term interpersonal connections. He can mostly only imagine them. He wants them, but he can't find a way to make them, so he tries to turn those imagined connections into reality just by saying them.

And again, it's definitely accidental, but it's weirdly fitting that the one other character he actually does have any canonical basis for an 'old friend' thing with... leaves. Which is Ratchet. It's weirdly fitting I think that Ratchet, who actually knew him in some intimate capacity pre-war, who is his old friend, is the person who is explicitly like 'no, I can't stay here anymore because there's no room for me' and leaves him, not unkindly, but definitively.